Sickening: Get your catwalk look just right and you’ll be one sickening queen. For example, if a runway theme on RuPaul’s Drag Race is The Western and a contestant executes a perfect combo of boots, gingham, Stetson and pigtails, they are ‘serving up cowgirl realness’. Manage that successfully and they are ‘serving realness’. Realness: When a drag queen is given a theme to meet, outfit-wise, the intention is to blend into the genre as though born into it. It’s important to note that reads usually finish with all involved on good terms. This is the act of reading, a playful sport where the aim is to throw the cleverest, most ingenious piece of verbal takedown at your opponent. Read: Drag queens will often meet in a metaphorical arena known as the library to openly exchange insults with each other. To ‘throw’ shade is to openly disparage someone, whether or not they are in your presence. Shade: An insult, either spoken or expressed through body language. These including Danny La Rue in the UK, who made his name in the 1950s, and Dame Edna Everage, the flamboyant creation of comedian Barry Humphries, who first appeared in the 1960s. While there was a tolerance, even celebration of drag and LGBT people in the USA during the 1920s and early '30s (known as the 'pansy craze'), American society became more reactionary in the mid-1930s, amid fears surrounding sex crime, which had a negative impact on the way drag was perceived.Īfter the Second World War, although homosexuality was still frowned upon by society as a whole - even illegal in some cases - there were still drag acts who broke through the negativity and had successful careers. Hugely popular, for more than 20 years, Eltinge’s career was very much on an upward trajectory, until variety acts fell out of favour in the 1930s. At the end of performances, he would remove his wig and reveal his gender to the crowd, often to cries of disbelief. Whereas many drag queens played on the fact they were men in women’s clothing, Eltinge (as she was often known) had many fans convinced she was not a character, but a genuine actress.Įltinge emerged from the world of vaudeville, known as variety theatre in the UK, where cross-dressing was very popular. One of the biggest stars of the earliest 20th century was Julian Eltinge. As time went on, drag became more about the individual and the queens built up their own fanbases.
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